With the release of Ghostbusters Afterlife, we wanted to dig into the lore of the franchise and talk about the architect of the madness, Ivo Shandor and his cult of Gozer. While this hadn’t been confirmed before the film came out, the character turned out to be at the heart of the plot for the film, which sees Egon Spengler’s grandchildren, Phoebe and Trevor, finishing what their grandfather started.
It follows on from our piece on the Ghostbusters Afterlife villain, which was confirmed in its entirety in the recent international trailer. It features the two demon dog demigods from the first film – Zuul, the Gatekeeper, and Vinz Clortho, the Keymaster – as well as more of the Sumerian shapeshifting god of destruction, Gozer, who is the ultimate bad gal of the film.
AdvertisementHowever, as in the first film, it’s only because of the efforts of Ivo Shandor and his cult of Gozer that she’s able to return to earth to unleash her destruction. As a result, this is the case again for the third film in the main canon for the series and we’ll try to explain it all in more detail below, so you understand who he is and why he’s so important, despite Gozer’s response to him.
Who is Ivo Shandor?
Ivo Shandor was a doctor and architect in the early 20th century, who dedicated his life to the worship of Gozer the Gozerian. He founded the cult with the help of his many wealthy followers and designed the apartment that Dana Barrett (Sigourney Weaver) lived in to be a beacon for spiritual power – using Selenium mined from Summerville – and ultimately a portal for the coming of Gozer.
AdvertisementIn the first film, Dana became possessed by the Gatekeeper, Zuul, and her neighbour Louis Tully got taken over by its counterpart, the Keymaster, Vinz Clortho. To begin with, they stay in human form, which is a similar this for two of the characters from Ghostbusters Afterlife who serve in a similar capacity to unleash Gozer once again.
However, they go on to become the demigod demon dogs that we all know and kind of love from the first film and you can see the two slavering monsters once again in the international trailer for Afterlife. They had only been teased slightly in previous trailers, but with the latest one there’s no doubting their presence in the upcoming film. With these in place it was a logical assumption for Shandor to be involved and you can read more about how that has come to pass in the section below.
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We’ll update you with more details on Ivo Shandor when the film’s release date comes around and you can also see additional info on the film with the official Twitter page at https://twitter.com/Ghostbusters.
What is Ivo Shandor’s link to Ghostbusters Afterlife?
AdvertisementWith Gozer, Zuul and Clortho all confirmed, it was logical that Ivo Shandor and his cult of Gozer would be behind it all again. The last time we saw Egon Spengler, he was happy continuing his research work into the occult in New York, so there must have been a reason for him to ship out to Summerville, Oklahoma, where the new film is set.
If you followed that through and look for clues in the international trailer, you can see that the mine that is the source of the new crop of ghosts is actually an underground shrine to Gozer. Shandor built the building that brought her back the first time, so it stood to reason that he had a hand in the construction of the shrine inside the mine shaft to give her more opportunities to return with her “choose and perish” thing.
When we looked at it from this point of view, it was easy to assume that Egon decamped to the American mid-west to continue his research into the many tendrils of the cult and to try to shut Goza down once and for all, which also turned out to be the case. Sadly, he didn’t manage to complete the job in Summerville, so it’s up to his grand-kids to get the job done with the help of Ecto-1 and the rest of the Ghostbusters kit that he left behind.
The big question, though, was whether or not the original villain would end up being the ultimate evil force for them to face. It initially seemed a bit too much like fan nostalgia to base it all on the first film without throwing in a curve ball, so we’re hoping that this will turn out to be the case with Afterlife. However, it’s pretty much all Goza and her faithful architect, who doesn’t get any rewards for his efforts.
One possible alternative we considered was for the ghost of Ivo Shandor himself to be pulling the strings this time around. He could have orchestrated the return of Gozer and the demigods, but when that didn’t quite go to plan, he may have been able to step in with the power he’s been able to amass in the spirit realm and brings it all to bear to shake the town to its core.
That might sound like it’s a little far fetched, but Ivo Shandor has already been the final boss villain in the Ghostbusters Videogame in a similar capacity, so there was a good chunk of precedent for this. However, as it turns out, he’s just a lapdog that gets torn asunder as soon as he imparts his plan to his divine obsession.
You can check out our movie news section to keep tabs on the latest upcoming film release dates, age rating and parents guide details, or visit the Ghostbusters website to see more on the film at www.ghostbusters.com.
